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It is absolutely not french anything, but instead, french and english both decend from latin. English decending from french you say! The nerve! (I assure you,
by b112 1y ago
It is absolutely not french anything, but instead, french and english both decend from latin.
English decending from french you say! The nerve!
(I assure you, my 6th grade english teacher would correct you thusly)
- hidelooktropic 1y agoYou might want to review the influence of William the conqueror on the English language.
- alentred 1y agoYou mean, Guillaume le Conquérant ?
- mrsvanwinkle 1y agosnortèd
- dragontamer 1y agoHow fitting for that bastard to be the one who bastardized our language!!
- fooker 1y agoFrench had several hundred years of established literary tradition when English was still 'descending'. Not that it matters, given that we are talking about this in English, which has become the lingua franca in an amusing twist of fate, thanks to the East India Company.
- School-Cotton 1y agoBeowulf, the earliest major work of English literature, is from somewhere between the 8th and 11th centuries. French certainly did not have "several hundred years of established literary tradition" by that time, even if you pick the latter date.
- pcrh 1y agoLa Chanson de Roland (The Song of Roland) is dated to between 1129 and 1165. It resembles modern French much more than Beowulf resembles modern English. Few English speakers today could read Beowulf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_of_Roland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_of_Roland https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanson_de_Roland https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanson_de_Roland
- signal11 1y agoThis is a great example of moving the goalposts re the original (false) point that a previous comment made about French having a longer literary history than English. If you’ve got a specific agenda, say x > y, you can be very selective about success criteria to suit yourself. In this particular case of English and French, the reality is that few modern French speakers can read the Song of Roland. “Resembles x much more” is pretty irrelevant because it cherry-picks similarities while glossing over differences. One can equally say Old English’s “and forgyf us ure gyltas” is pretty readable, but really you’re scraping the bottom of the argument barrel. Also glossing over an older literary tradition because the language mutated in response to a new political reality (conquest) is ... curious.
- reverius42 1y agoI don't think it's moving the goalposts to say that something understandable by modern French speakers has an older literary tradition than something understandable by modern English speakers. You can call what we speak today "English" but it barely resembles the language used in Beowulf.
- signal11 1y agoYou’re entitled to your opinion. All I’ll say is that in the context of the bald fact (French has an older literary tradition than English) presented by a previous commenter, “understandable by modern speakers” is moving the goalposts. In my opinion of course. Also > something understandable by modern French speakers The Song of Roland, used as an example in a previous comment, doesn’t qualify, and actually is yet another reason why this line of argument is pretty sad.
- signal11 1y agoHeh. English actually has an older written tradition than French. Not that it’s a competition or anything. But it’s interesting to see people make assumptions about easily-looked-up stuff.
- reverius42 1y agoOld English is pretty unintelligible by modern English speakers though. Middle English much more so, but wasn't that already French-influenced?
- School-Cotton 1y agoEnglish does not descend from Latin. It descends from Old English, a language that is entirely unrelated to Latin besides both being Indo-European, and has been influenced to a substantial degree by Norman French (which does descend from Latin) since the 11th century. At least that is the conventional view. Apparently, according to this author, it actually descends from French. But that is a very fringe take.
- riffraff 1y agoThe author does not actually make this claim, he only does tongue in cheek to show that Norman has a much larger influenced on the evolution of English vocabulary than usually thought.
- jbn 1y agoThis is right on point. I read this book recently, by coincidence, and it's funny and fascinating at the same time (at least for someone who speaks both English and French).
- adamzwasserman 1y agoThe conventional view is that the aristocracy spoke French and the hoi poloi spoke old English. This is why modern english is a mix.
- libraryatnight 1y agoEnglish was Germanic - we get our Latin influence from Old French https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence_of_French_on_English https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence_of_French_on_English
- b112 1y agoI see the French have been very busy with articles such as this. Clearly an attempt to take the shine off of "that sub language english" which keeps pestering their ears. From what I was repeatedly taught by my English, english teacher, all the latin loanwords came from when the Romans were hanging around the Isles. "They left more than walls!", she'd say. Take care now, lest her ghost rise from the grave to correct your slanders against her beloved english.
- DemocracyFTW2 1y ago> french and english both de[s]cend from latin no